Ianto Jones and the Airship Pirates
by black.k.kat
Summary: Being a tale of misadventure, clockwork, and true love. (Steampunk!AU)
1. Chapter 1

**Rating:** R-ish

**Word count:** ~ 6600

**Warnings: **Passing mention of severe off-screen injury, massive amounts of sleep-deprived-author!weirdness.

**Summary:** Being a tale of misadventure, clockwork, and true love.

**Disclaimer: **All recognizable characters are the property of their respective owners. I am in no way associated with the creators, and no copyright infringement is intended.

**A/N: **For those who are term-savvy, this is a mix of clockpunk and steampunk, with a dash of cyberpunk (light on the punk, in all cases) thrown in for variety. For those who aren't, this is steampunk. Enough said.

**A/N2:** I'd been _hoping_ to get this finished so I could post it all at once, but that doesn't look like it's happening any time soon. So, I'm just going to throw this out there as a celebration of my one-year anniversary of saying "to hell with it" and banging out my first Torchwood fic. Yeah, you read that right. One (1) year. Forty-eight (48!) stories. Dear heavens. So, yay! I've survived this fandom so far. Here's to the future! :D

* * *

_**Ianto Jones and the Airship Pirates**_

_**Being a Tale of Misadventure, Clockwork, and True Love**_

There is a finch singing outside the window.

Ianto pauses in his work, flat on his back and sprawled out beneath a triple-expansion engine for the Royal Fleet's oldest air ship. But the finch keeps singing, bright and lovely, and he slowly lifts his head.

It's a plain brown house finch perched in the bare, spindly tree outside of his workshop, and it cocks its head as Ianto rises to his feet. There's no fear in its eyes as it hops closer, chirping, but Ianto keeps his movements slow and deliberate as he crosses to the stand on the other side of the room. There is another bird perched there, watching him with jet eyes. She's in the shape of a nightingale, but her feathers are finely wrought silver and gold, and her feet are made of copper wire. When Ianto reaches for her, she hops onto his outstretched hand and flutters her clockwork wings.

"Off you go, Myfanwy," Ianto chides, raising his hand a little. With a hiss of gears, the nightingale obeys, gliding over to the window ledge. She lands easily and tips her head to regard the finch. Then she opens her wings a little, takes a small hop forward to where the window stands open, and chirps.

In a rush of feathers and frantic cheeping, the finch explodes off the branch and takes to the sky. It's gone in an instant, terrified of a creature that is more clockwork than it is alive, and the nightingale is left on the windowsill, fluttering wings that catch the light and shine like something precious.

With a soft sigh, Ianto makes his way over and scoops up the nightingale, setting her on his shoulder. The little creature makes a nearly apologetic sound, curling tiny claws into the fabric of his shirt, and Ianto puts up a hand to stroke her breast.

"Sorry," he murmurs, ignoring the trace of an ache settling under his heart. "I thought you'd get on better than that. Shows what I know, hm?"

Myfanwy chirps sadly and then swoops off his shoulder, alighting on her perch again and opening her beak. When she sings, though, it's not a nightingale's song that fills the room.

That's yet another thing that Ianto couldn't give her.

The song is lovely, though, taken on its own merits, and Ianto smiles a little as he turns back to the engine. There's something wrong with the motor unit that's making the pistons fire incorrectly, and while in theory it's an easy fix, the engine is old and weary. Ianto can only do so much for it, and the Admiral of the Fleet has rejected his idea to scrap it and build a new one. Something about sentimentality and preserving traditions, Ianto thinks with a snort. While he's all for tradition and ceremony, there's only so much that's practical before the real world gets in the way.

He abandons the wrench he'd been using before and crawls back under the engine with a candle and a jeweler's glass, attempting to find any hairline cracks that might be releasing pressure. It's long, tedious work, even with Myfanwy's song to sooth his nerves, but he's grown used to it. This isn't even the work he was _trained _for, but he can't complain. It's work, and in the end, he's learned that's all that matters.

And the damn thing has _three_ cracks, not one. Ianto hates inefficiency, and repairing this old heap of junk is that to a tee. He's halfway tempted to let the scrapper "accidentally" take it to the junkyard on the next scrap run, but it's not worth the fuss First Admiral Hartman will raise.

By the time he's patched the cracks and treated vulnerable areas to prevent any more from forming, the clock is chiming the first hour of morning, and Ianto aches all over. He heaves himself out from under the engine and straightens gingerly, rubbing a gloved hand over his sore right shoulder. Grease is setting stiff in his hair and drying in thick streaks on his skin, and he smells like very old engine. Stifling a weary sigh, he rubs his hands over his face then reaches out for Myfanwy. She flutters over obligingly, although she's careful not to get any grease on her as she settles delicately on his wrist.

"Such a princess," Ianto tells her, amused, but he lets her keep her place instead of moving her up to his shoulder as he normally would. The bath is calling, followed by his gloriously soft bed, and the engine is finished until the next time the Fleet engineers manage to break it. He and Myfanwy are still the only living creatures in the echoingly large house, and the city outside is quiet.

Ianto is more than ready to forget his thoughts in sleep, at least temporarily.

He blows out the lamps, shuts the door of his main workroom, and carefully locks it behind him.

* * *

Ianto is sixteen when he first realizes that he's not just going to be a simple engineer for the rest of his life.

He's sixteen and a little wild still, wary and fresh from the gutter where he retreated by choice when his father was alive, and by necessity afterwards. But he's the equivalent of a journeyman, apprenticed to an old friend of his father's who is a dockside engineer and a decent enough man. Engineering is boring, though, to a mind as quick as Ianto's, and he's already looking for _something_ that will be _more_.

Then he finds a nightingale in a gutter, dying but most certainly not yet dead, and takes her home with him. It has never been easy for Ianto to be sensible about life and death, and this is no exception. But he has a quick mind and quick hands and a certain sort of mulish I'll-die-before-I-let-go tenacity, and a clockwork cat that he's been building and tinkering with in his spare time, trying to make it change shape.

It's a feat that even most trained mechanists struggle with, but Ianto takes the nightingale, transfers her brain to the cat's body, gives the clockwork a swift-brave bird-heart to power it, and saves one tiny, precious life.

There's no possible way he can ever be just an engineer after that.

The next day he walks up to a man named Rupert Howarth on the street, hands shaking but shoulders squared, Myfanwy the clockwork cat in his arms, and says, "Please. Teach me."

* * *

"Careful! That's worth far more than your life, cadet!" Ianto snaps, sliding down the outer edge of the clockwork driver. He lands on the metal planking of the engineering deck with a clatter, Myfanwy swooping behind him, and waves the hovering sailors off impatiently as he ducks under the creaking clockwork. The cadet in question backs away with wide eyes, giving way as Ianto takes his place in guiding the next gear into its housing. One of the teeth snags the sleeve of his shirt, tearing it nearly off, but he just pushes the cuff up and begins tightening the mechanism.

"Taking jobs from the cadets again, Mr. Jones?" an amused voice asks from beyond the screen of turning cogs.

Ianto tightens a final screw before ducking back out, coming face to face with a lovely, dark-skinned woman in a red corset and blouse, her skirt hitched up in a practical manner with straps that lift it above her tall boots. He smiles at her and dips his head in greeting as Myfanwy comes to land on his shoulder again.

"Not at all, Dr. Jones," he returns, taking the hand she offers and gallantly kissing the back of it. "I'm simply ensuring that everything is prepared for the new engineer. Preserving the pride of the Fleet and all that."

Martha laughs at him and pulls her hand away, swatting him gently in the side of the head as she does. "I believe we termed that 'over-indulging your obsessive need to control things,' Ianto. Mechanists aren't supposed to be doing grunt work."

Ianto tries very hard not to roll his eyes. It's mostly a success. "Martha, stop mothering. If you want _Torchwood_ to launch on time, you'll let me obsess. A ship of this scale requires it for a smooth maiden flight."

Of course, the best way to distract Martha from _anything_ is to mention the impending launch. Her dark eyes light up and she latches on to Ianto's arm, pulling him towards the door. "Oh, you must come see! We've finally gotten the navigation instruments set on the bridge. They're the most sensitive ever used on an airship of this class—Singh swears that they'll be able to spot even a one-man craft almost one league out, and measure any atmospheric conditions within two."

Stifling a laugh, Ianto lays his hand over Martha's and murmurs, "Careful, Dr. Jones. Your cartographer's showing."

She makes a face at him, but manages to contain herself, smoothing down the white cross on the sleeve of her blouse that proclaims her a fully qualified physician. She's got training as a cartographer too, of course—that's where she and Ianto met, at the Royal Society for the Advancement of Aeronautics—but in Ianto's opinion, it was a waste of her talents. She's a brilliant navigator but an even better doctor. The empire has far too many of the former and too few of the latter.

"Has the First Admiral chosen a crew yet?" Ianto asks as Martha guides him up one level and down a long corridor. There's a ladder set into the wall at the end, next to the window, to provide a shortcut up to the bridge. Politely, Ianto goes first, though Martha is entirely aware that he has no interest in looking up her skirt. The hatch at the top squeaks a little, and Ianto pauses to pull out his small flask of oil and grease the hinges before pulling himself up onto the bridge.

When he reaches back around to offer a hand up, Martha is rolling her eyes at him. She lets him help her, though, and answers, "Not that I've heard, but then, I'm just the mechanics and technology liaison. I've nothing to do with recruitment, especially not on a top-of-the-line new model like this."

"Shame," Ianto remarks distractedly, his ears already picking up the slightly uneven hum of machinery that's a little out of alignment. Myfanwy chirps an agreement and drops from his shoulder, fluttering across the room to land on an instrument panel. Ianto follows her, immediately crouching down to examine the mechanism. As he'd thought, the delicate clockwork isn't spinning smoothly; one of the cogs seems to be halfway jammed. Sighing between his teeth, Ianto ducks down to fix it.

Martha leans against the nearest console to watch him work. "You know they're going to want you on this crew," she remarks. "You're the best mechanist in the Fleet; Hartman's not going to trust anyone else with _Torchwood_, not on the maiden voyage."

"Martha. You know why they won't." Ianto shoots her a dark look to hide the uncomfortable feeling bubbling up in his chest. At one point, it was his dream to work as a mechanist on an airship. It was what he trained for, what he aimed to do ever since he could first hold a wrench. But sometimes, he's learned more recently, dreams have to die.

It's a fact of life, and one that it's high time he accepted.

Martha's reluctance is obvious, but she subsides with only a little grumbling—less, certainly, than she would give if she didn't understand his reasons. He's not good to be around people, not in cramped quarters for extended periods of time, with a quickly moving rumor mill. And, no matter how large an airship seems in port, in flight it's _always_ going to be cramped, and its rumor mill would put that of Society to shame.

Myfanwy chirps, a quiet question, and then hops off the instrument stand and down to the floor. Ianto pauses in his repairs to watch, worried—as always—that something will go wrong with the process and she'll—

With a grinding and creaking of sprockets and springs, the nightingale's shape folds in on itself and then expands, the silver and gold feathers sliding away to be replaced with silken-fine fur. Fifteen seconds is all it takes before the hissing cogs stop, and a small bronze cat sits at Ianto's feet, her tail twitching. She looks up, blinks wide emerald eyes at Ianto, and then trots off to inspect the far corner of the room.

Martha watches her go, eyes a little wide. She takes a breath and then lays a hand over her chest. "Hearts and high-flyers, I'd forgotten what it was like when she did that." Her gaze shifts to Ianto, and there's admiration in it, a little bit of awe. "You're incredible, Mr. Jones."

"Myfanwy's the amazing one," Ianto demurs, sliding the panel shut and rising to his feet. "I gave her the ability, but she's the one who learned to use it. Not many creatures could have done that."

"Nevertheless." Martha reaches out to take his hand, regardless of the oil and grime ground into the skin. "Being a mechanist—how incredible, Ianto."

Ianto turns to look at Myfanwy, who's found a dust bunny to bat across the decking, and has to smile. It is. He forgets so often, takes it for granted, but it _is_. Myfanwy is everything that makes it worthwhile. With a soft chuckle, Ianto nods, accepting the point with grace even as he lifts a hand to rub at his right shoulder.

"All right," he agrees, watching Myfanwy flop onto her side in a patch of sunlight and start up a rumbling purr. He turns to Martha, who is beaming at him, and raises an eyebrow. "May I return to work now?"

"_Your_ work," Martha emphasizes sternly, though her laugh lines are showing. "Leave menial work to the cadets, Ianto."

"Yes, mum," Ianto drawls, then scoops up Myfanwy, throws himself through the hatch, and slides down the ladder before Martha can take another swing at him.

* * *

He's seventeen when the first accident happens, a moment of not-quite-carelessness mixed with incredibly bad luck while working with a vast, ancient merchant-ship engine, and when the smoke clears and the fires have been put out Ianto is left with one arm, one working hand, and enough misdirected anger to start a land war. It's not just the loss of his right hand, his right arm from the shoulder down, but that's the main part of it.

Rupert Howarth is a good man, though, an earl who devotes all of his time to clockwork and steam engines, and he wastes no time in getting another arm made, this one of brass and copper and iron, light but strong and just as deft as Ianto's original. Ianto is thankful, but that only makes him angrier at everything and nothing. He's terrified, too, that this could be the end of it, that he'll never again be able to set a clockwork system or tinker with the maddeningly tiny motors that are a mechanist's trade.

The prosthetics surgeon tells him not to be too hopeful, and that's the same as telling him to despair.

And then Ianto walks outside one day with his sleeve rolled up and Myfanwy on his shoulder, and there are whispers. People stare, and murmur "Mechanist" behind their hands, and slide around Ianto on the street with as much space between them as possible.

Ianto _hates_ them. He hates them so very much.

His arm hurts. It aches is cold weather and burns in hot, stiffens up in the damp and never, ever works as it should. Prosthetic arms are never anyone's first choice—too many problems for too great a cost—but for Ianto it's the only chance he has of ever having two working hands, of being able to do a mechanist's work. So he thanks Rupert for the gift, grits his teeth against the stares, and walks out the door of Rupert's house in the city with his head held high.

The whispers never stop, but they grow…bearable.

* * *

Ianto doesn't go out often, even though he lives in the middle of the city, and when he does it tends to be after nightfall. It's personal preference more that any prejudice against mechanists—though, as far as that goes, engineers are far more respected and not nearly as feared.

It's telling that, even after dark, people give Ianto—and Myfanwy, perched on his shoulder in her cat form—a very wide berth. She'll never be able to pass as a real animal, as anything other than what she is, and while Ianto is tempted sometimes to find a way where she _could_, he's never been able to bring himself to do so. It's not fair to either of them.

One of the boys on the corner, wrapped in rags and shadows, watches Ianto pass with dark eyes, clutching a bundle wrapped in greasy newsprint to his chest. Ianto feels a pang at the sight of those wary, weary eyes—he knows that feeling, has been in that place before, and it's not somewhere he ever wants to go back to. But he also knows that the boy won't accept anything from anyone right now, so he simply tips his dove grey derby in greeting and continues down the road. Myfanwy isn't quite so reserved; she trots to within a few feet of the boy and offers a cat-chirp, then flicks her tail and darts after Ianto.

As she winds between his feet and then slips off to investigate the gutters, Ianto takes one more glance at the boy, but he's gone. Back in the shadows, doubtless, where he thinks he belongs.

There's nothing that Ianto can say that will make him think differently, either.

The constable at the next corner nods to Ianto, friendly for all that they've never spoken. Ianto nods back, steps never slowing as he crosses street. A lone carriage rattles past, noisy over the cobblestones, and it kicks up a few loose sheets of paper left in the gutter. One flutters past Ianto, borne on a tired wind, and he only spares enough of a glance to see that it's yet another cry for revolution.

Everyone wants to overturn the Empire, it seems, but no one's gotten up the courage to actually _do_ anything yet aside from a few splinter groups and madmen. And that doesn't look to be changing soon.

The wind changes, the air shifts, and the leaflet tumbles end over end into the street and is caught by a puddle of filthy brown water.

Ianto spares it one last glance before rounding the corner, and hailing a hansom cab.

"The Academy of Aeronautical Engineering and Mechanical Sciences," he tells the driver, and the man tips his hat agreeably. Ianto nods in return and ducks into the dark interior of the cab, pulling the door shut behind him. Myfanwy is already curled up on the worn seat, jeweled eyes catching what little light there is and burning with it.

"You won't be able to go in looking like that," Ianto tells her with some amusement. "What would the other birds say?"

She manages to look down her nose at him with every ounce of feline disdain the comment is worth, and then yawns delicately. It shows off her sharp ivory teeth quite nicely.

"Point taken," Ianto allows, trying not to laugh. He gets the feeling it won't be appreciated.

The cab suddenly hits a particularly vicious bump, knocking Ianto into the wall shoulder-first, and he sucks in a sharp breath that is equal parts surprise and pain as something beneath the skin wrenches. Ianto slaps a hand over it, trying to feel through his frock coat and shirt if the skin has been torn, but there's nothing leaking through. Just a lingering ache and burn from where the gears have shifted in a way they're not meant to.

With a grimace, Ianto tugs off his calfskin gloves and wiggles his fingers, checking that nothing's been damaged to the point of inhibiting movement. As a mechanist, his hands are the most precious part of him, and the thought that they could be ruined by something as inane and meaningless as a rough street is truly horrifying. But for the moment his fear is unrealized; there's no hesitation in the movements, and the motor response seems typical. The arm moves freely, the elbow bends smoothly, and there's no tingling or numbness to indicate a nerve has been hit.

Myfanwy chirps worriedly, a nearly birdlike sound, and sits up to watch him more closely. Ianto manages a smile for her, hoping it doesn't look as wan as it feels, and offers, "I'll be fine, my beauty. Just a bit of a bump. Would you let me know when we reach the street?"

Even though she looks entirely unconvinced, Myfanwy chirps a dubious agreement and stands up, putting her paws on the edge of the window. Seeing that she'll be occupied until they reach their destination, Ianto closes his eyes and leans back against the wall, evening out his breath and controlling his heartbeat.

Pain is in the mind. Mechanical limbs always come with a price attached, and this is what Ianto has to pay to keep his promise and continue his work. Admittedly, the work is important enough that he'd do it without the promise, but Lisa asked.

Ianto never was able to say no to her.

Letting out a long breath, too heavy to be a sigh, Ianto forces his muscles to relax and then breathes deep, the pain easing to a dull, manageable soreness. There's a soft chirrup from the other side of the cab and then a warm weight is suddenly landing in his lap, vibrating happily. Ianto smiles a little, eyes still closed, and strokes his fingers through Myfanwy's silken fur. For the last three years, it's been the two of them together, and while Ianto's penchant for dramatics isn't strong enough to say that it's been them against the world, it's most certainly been them against the overwhelming pull of loneliness.

It's been a hard adjustment, but Ianto has always been a little distant, a little reserved. This isn't so different than his childhood, watching a man who had once been his hero descend into drunkenness, his beautiful clockwork abandoned in favor of the bottle and a few swings at his quiet, precocious son. Ianto is an outsider here too, even though it's his own life and that shouldn't be possible. But for all that he loves his work, loves Myfanwy and the others he creates, loves the engines and machines with their complexities and personalities, he hates Hartman and her like, hates that she's about to become Queen and have free rein to reshape the world in her twisted image.

Four years ago, living happily with a beautiful, sweet woman, working a prestigious if somewhat misunderstood job, entirely content with his life and apparent future, Ianto would never have thought he could sympathize with the dissidents.

But then the accident had happened, and Ianto had once again been forced to face what he had learned as a child living almost entirely on the streets and then tried to forget.

The cab jolts around a corner and slows, and the driver's voice calls out, "The Academy, sir."

Scooping Myfanwy up in one arm, Ianto opens the door and steps down, nodding to the driver. He digs out the requested coins for payment and steps onto the street as the horses set off again, splashing water up from the puddles. He sidesteps it absently, though it makes Myfanwy hiss a bit and scramble up onto his shoulder. Ianto, long since used to her sudden bursts of exceptionally cat-like behavior, endures her claws patiently as she settles herself under his left ear, still bristling.

"Set?" he asks her amusedly, and gets a growl in return. With a soft chuckle, he turns and makes for the grand, imposing entrance to the Academy, all gilded doors and dull grey brick. There's a pair of engineers coming out as he nears, and one pauses to hold the door for him. Ianto smiles his thanks, tips his hat, and steps in, breathing in the dusty paper smell that has managed to seep into every inch of stone in the building. It's comforting in a way that not much manages to be anymore, more familiar than anything else in Ianto's world aside from clockwork and steampower.

"Ianto, my boy! Prompt as ever, I see!" someone calls, and Ianto turns to see a tall, older gentleman with a silver-handled walking stick approaching. He's stately despite his advancing years, still sporting muscles gained over a lifetime working with heavy machinery, and has a bearing few can rival no matter their age. Ianto feels something in his chest warm, and smiles as he removes his hat. This man is the closest thing to a true father he's known in over twenty years, and Ianto adores him far more than is likely proper, given the circumstances.

"Lord Howarth," he greets him, and at the stern look amends, "Rupert. You're looking very well."

Rupert Howarth claps him on the shoulder—nearly upsetting Myfanwy, though she bears it with good grace—and then steers him down a long hallway. "'Course I am," he protests. "It would take more than a broken leg to stop me, my boy, and I'm insulted you would think otherwise."

Ianto rolls his eyes a little at that, because Rupert broke his leg while climbing up a precariously fastened ladder in the bowels of the palace, attempting to tinker with one of the chronically malfunctioning engines there. It's hardly the first time, either, and Ianto knows very well that it won't be the last. Lord Rupert Howarth, Earl of Castlehaven, is one of the most accomplished engineers in the Empire, and has been since he was little older than Ianto is now.

"It's _very_ good you're not married," he informs his mentor dryly. "I've no doubt any woman who had to put up with you and your madcap antics would make herself a widow inside of six months."

Rupert laughs, loud and free and unconcerned for propriety—but then, he's ever been that way, and it's one of the things Ianto likes best about him, though he has a hard time following the man's example. "And still you underestimate me," he prods gently. "Six months? I'd give it six weeks, if that!"

Ianto surrenders the point with an agreeable chuckle, allowing himself to be directed into Rupert's office. As ever, it's been crammed with prototypes and bits of clockwork, pieces of whatever dozen side projects Rupert is currently working on or anything that's managed to catch his magpie eye in his frequent wanderings around the city. Myfanwy immediately takes an interest in a swinging pendulum and abandons Ianto's shoulder in favor of investigating. He and Rupert both watch her go, Ianto equal parts exasperated and indulgent and Rupert curious.

"What a sight," he murmurs, patting Ianto's now-free shoulder absently. "An automaton with the heart of a bird and the mind of a cat. Still no problems that you've encountered with the design, then?"

"Not at all." Ianto settles himself into the lone chair that's managed to escape the chaotic overflow of mechanisms and takes the cup of tea that's offered. After a wary check to make sure it _does_ contain tea—he's never quite recovered from the incident with the engine oil—he takes a sip. "She's adjusted perfectly; better than most humans would, I believe. She's…"

"Extraordinary," Rupert finishes for him, smile soft. "As are you, my boy. And how goes the work on _Torchwood_? I hear she's a magnificent thing."

Ianto thinks of the immense engines, the gleaming clockwork, the decks with their polished wood and wrought metal, and has to smile. "She is," he agrees. "Quite magnificent. Though I'm surprised you've yet to see her, Rupert—has someone banned you for fear of what you'll do to her?"

Rupert chuckles, settling back with his own cup of tea. "Not at all, dear boy. But _Torchwood_ is a thing of the new generation, and a relic of the old has no place working on her. I'll content myself with viewing your success from the docks when she launches."

Ianto shakes his head at that, equal parts confused and amused. Rupert is an odd one, and whenever he gets notions into his head, it takes a few solid whacks with a blunt object to remove them. There hasn't been a chance to address this one, and from the look Rupert is giving him, there won't be one now. The subject is closed, and Ianto surrenders to the inevitable change of subject with good grace.

"And your lectures?" he asks instead. "Still driving your students mad?"

"Of course! They don't have your inquiring mind, Ianto, and I despair of the future if this is what the next generation of engineers and mechanists is like." He shakes his head and sighs wearily. "Why, I had to explain the concept of integration of parts and energy output three times! Truly shameful."

There's a brief pause, and that alone is odd enough to make Ianto raise a brow at him, because Rupert is a cheerful waterfall of information and ideas at all times. Silence is an unknown thing in his presence. But the older man looks faintly troubled, and when Ianto makes an inquiring sound, he simply smiles wearily. That too is unknown, because Rupert is always vital and brilliant and full of energy, a driving force behind everything he puts his mind to.

At length, Rupert sets his cup carefully on his desk and look up to meet Ianto's eyes. "I'm getting no younger, my boy," he says eventually. "And as you've pointed out, I've no wife, nor any children of my own. I'm the last of my line, with no one left to carry on the title."

With a sinking feeling, Ianto begins to suspect where this is headed.

"Rupert," he begins warningly, but the man cuts him off before he can say anything further.

"No, no, hear me out. I'm in need of an heir, someone to continue the line, and I don't want some empty-headed fool of a dandy who won't understand my life's work. Think on it, Ianto, because I have, and there's no one I would rather take my title. While I understand your objections, I also find myself entirely unable to care what the rest of polite society will think of it, or me. Being eccentric has its uses."

Ianto takes a breath, because this is overwhelming for all that he's halfway suspected for a while now that it was coming. But Ianto is the son of a poor watchmaker who died when he was twelve, and to take on the title of an earl, especially with his past—

But.

But Rupert is an engineer and a mechanist, although few people ever gain both titles. He understands Ianto's devotion to his work, and—

And if he were to take the position, to allow Rupert to formally adopt him, then he would be eligible to serve as an airship's mechanist once more. Not only eligible, but also _wanted_. Those with titles are always first in line when crew are picked, and though Ianto's repeated requests to serve have been ignored, becoming Rupert's heir will move him from the very bottom of the list to the very top, regardless of past deeds.

It's been his dream for so long, though abandoned when Lisa died and he made all of the wrong choices for the right reasons. Rupert is tempting him with it now, because he knows what Ianto wants—often better than Ianto does himself—and isn't above using it to get himself an heir.

Rupert's always been a cunning bastard like that, and it's one of the things Ianto admires greatly about him.

He always wins, as well, and from the spreading smile on his face as he watches Ianto, he clearly knows that this time is no different.

Clapping his hands together cheerily, the earl rises to his feet and comes around the desk to pull Ianto up as well. "No time to waste!" he enthuses. "Off to file the paperwork then, my boy. Come along—the offices are only open for another two hours, and if we wait any longer you'll doubtless change you mind. Hurry, hurry, off we go!"

As ever, at least where Rupert Howarth is involved, Ianto gives in and lets himself be steered. It's easier that way, and it's never, ever boring.

* * *

Older now but still too young, three weeks from eighteen and certification as a fully qualified mechanist, and Ianto follows Rupert to Castlehaven and his estate, because there's nothing else to do until the exams. It's his first long flight on an airship, and even if this one is a passenger ship rather than a swift, sleek gunship, it's still beautiful to Ianto's eyes. He traces the flow of power from the vast steam engines up to where they wind the great clockwork gears that power the turbines and propellers, and is awed.

Rupert watches him that first night at dinner, smiling softly as Ianto expounds upon the numerous stupid mistakes the engineers have made, and Ianto doesn't care enough to ask him why.

(But it's the first time since Ianto lost his arm that he's shown an interest in anything, and Rupert is now certain that the mechanical arm was a good idea. If anything can save Ianto Jones right now, it's clockwork.)

The engineers tend to groan when Ianto approaches them, or chase him away with claims of too little time, but the mechanists in the other half of the deck are more than happy to speak with him, to let him immerse himself in their work. They like Myfanwy, laugh at her antics, and smile when they see her following Ianto, never more than three feet between them regardless of which form she's in. They understand her as an engineer never could, as normal people never will, and Ianto has never appreciated it so much before.

He is beneath a complex gear system that refuses to mesh smoothly, cursing the air blue, when the heavy tramp of hobnail boots pauses near his head. '_No mechanist, not with boots like those_,' Ianto thinks vaguely, jamming a screwdriver between his teeth and simply blinking when oil splatters across his face. Mechanists are up and down the ladders constantly, running across catwalks and climbing nimbly up the faces of the gears themselves. No self-respecting mechanist would wear such heavy, encumbering boots on the job.

And then a face appears on his left, nearly startling Ianto into swallowing the screwdriver. He jerks, cracks his right-hand knuckles hard against the closest sprocket, and the cog grinds as it snaps into place and starts spinning. Ianto winces.

The face, crowned by a mop of sandy-brown hair, takes on a decidedly sheepish cast. "Oops?" the man offers, holding out a hand to help Ianto to his feet.

Ianto pointedly ignores the hand, rolling out from under the system and calling, "Adeola, this one looks fine for now, but we might want to keep an eye on it."

Adeola, the pretty and frighteningly competent Chief Mechanist, raises a hand in acknowledgment as she peers at the gauges on the wall. Otherwise, she ignores him, and Ianto rises and turns to face the stranger with a glare already forming.

"Sorry!" the man cries preemptively, raising his hands as if to ward off a blow. "I thought you'd heard me."

"My _grandmother_ heard you, Harkness," Gareth, another mechanist, mutters as he lugs a tub of powdered chalk past them. "And she's been dead and buried for three years."

Seeing the hopeful and nearly pleading look the man—Harkness—is directing at him, Ianto shakes his head in exasperation. "Don't look at me—I'm in agreement. I just didn't expect you to try and crawl under there _with_ me."

Harkness grins at him, brilliant and very white, and it's so unexpectedly gorgeous that Ianto's breath catches somewhere low in his chest. He pauses, because the sensation is entirely unfamiliar.

Always, always before Ianto has seen clockwork and gears where most boys his age were seeing lovely faces and alluring forms, and this _want_ is entirely unexpected.

He freezes, but Harkness thankfully doesn't notice as he offers his hand again. "I'm Jack," he says cheerfully. "Lieutenant Jack Harkness, soon to be Captain."

Ianto takes the hand—firm grip, calluses, big palm and long fingers, skin _hot_—but can't help the dry observation, "Captain? Perhaps I'm mistaken, sir, but you seem to be skipping a few ranks there in the middle."

Jack's answering grin is delighted. "And you are?" he purrs, leaning in a little too close.

Ianto debates answering, debates not, but before he can choose one way or another something along the far wall explodes, and alarm bells start ringing. He jerks himself away and heads there at a sprint, along with every other mechanist on duty, as the entire ship gives a shuddering lurch and tilts sharply.

This is the disaster of the day, apparently, and Ianto can't help the fierce sense of _right_ that comes over him whenever he's like this, surrounded by other mechanists and throwing himself full force into whatever danger has appeared. He's never thought of himself as a thrill seeker, never had a death wish, but this—

This is _him._

But he casts a single glance back to where Jack Harkness is watching him go with an odd expression, and thinks, '_Maybe…'_


	2. Chapter 2

**Rating:** R

**Word count:** ~ 7500

**Warnings: **Passing mention of severe off-screen injury, on-screen OC death, slight violence, and acute angst.

**Summary:** Being a tale of misadventure, clockwork, and true love.

**Disclaimer: **All recognizable characters are the property of their respective owners. I am in no way associated with the creators, and no copyright infringement is intended.

**A/N:** In the time between updates, I've learned why it's a good idea to pay far more attention while riding a bicycle in the city. Since I managed to dislocate my shoulder, fracture my wrist and two ribs, and break three fingers—all on my dominant side, of course—my current speed is not so much chicken-peck as slug-crawl, and updates are going to slow accordingly. Ugh. I'm sorry. -.-'

* * *

_**Ianto Jones and the Airship Pirates**_

_**Being a Tale of Misadventure, Clockwork, and True Love**_

The paperwork takes three days to go through. On the fourth day, just as the sun is rising, Rajesh Singh appears on Ianto's doorstep, dressed as immaculately as ever and carrying a sheaf of papers under one arm.

"Jones," he says when Ianto pulls open the door, squinting blearily in the pale light. He's yet to sleep and is sure it shows, beard-scruff and mussed hair and oil everywhere, bits of metal shavings still falling off his clothes. In contrast, Singh is the perfect picture of an Imperial Engineer, right down to his flawlessly shined shoes.

Ianto hates him just a bit for that.

"Singh," he answers as cordially as he can manage, and steps out of the doorway. "Won't you come in? I've just put on a pot of tea."

Singh inclines his head and follows Ianto down the hall, removing his hat and gloves as they walk. "Much obliged, Jones. It's quite cold for March."

"Unseasonably," Ianto agrees, ushering the engineer into his kitchen—a rough, bare room, as the majority of Ianto's house is devoted to his various workshops. It's a comfort that Singh doesn't glace twice at his surroundings; no engineer or mechanist worth their clockwork would waste room on a parlor when it could be used to house a laboratory. Instead, he takes a seat on one of the rough wooden stools immediately, and accepts the cup Ianto pushes across the table to him.

"Assam," Ianto offers in response to his questioning glance, taking his own seat. "What brings you out my way, Singh? Is the palace not keeping you busy enough?"

Singh snorts softly into his tea. "Hardly. But one of my assistants keeps an ear out for gossip, and she informed me that a records clerk came across an adoption notice yesterday. You're next in line to be Earl of Castlehaven, then?"

This is the start of it, apparently. Ianto lets out a slow breath and sinks back on his stool, cradling his cup between his hands. "So Rupert has informed me," he acknowledges dryly.

"One could do worse," Singh says cryptically after a moment. He's not looking at Ianto, but riffling through his stack of papers. As Ianto watches curiously, he tugs one out and tosses it onto the tabletop like a challenge.

"Chief Mechanist," he says after a moment, when Ianto makes no move to reach for it. "_Torchwood _is in need of the best, and while you might still be a social exile, you're a gifted mechanist with training as an engineer, and that's useful. If you agree to take the position, I can bring First Admiral Hartman around."

"You can?" Ianto asks, honestly doubtful. First Admiral Hartman is a ferocious woman, ambitious and driven to the point of blindness. Her sole aim in life is to succeed the throne now that the king has died, and she'll do anything to make it happen. It doesn't help that the only other contender is the king's fiery bastard daughter, raised as a stage actress and married to a newly accredited prosthetics surgeon. The common people want the daughter, but the nobles see Hartman as the only choice to preserve their ranks.

For Hartman, _Torchwood_ is her last, grand gesture before she appears at the council to choose the heir. Should the flight succeed, she'll doubtless be crowned the next Queen.

If the flight fails, if anything at all goes wrong, Amy Pond will take her late father's throne.

It stands to reason that Hartman will be more single-minded than ever, obsessed with perfection until that fixation becomes deadly—both for herself and those around her. She'll expect her crew to perform like no other, and punishment for failure to meet her expectations will likely be harsh. But if they succeed…

Ianto's name will always carry a taint of shame among those who know just what he did. It will even bleed over to the title Rupert has shared with him, and that's something Ianto cannot allow. Hartman's glory, should she win, will become her crew's glory, and even if all of Ianto's deeds won't be overlooked, the majority will.

It's an entirely selfish motivation, but Ianto grasps it to his heart with all of the determination in his body. A _chance_. One chance. That's all he needs.

Singh looks at Ianto, and there's a weary sort of acknowledgement in his eyes, but he nods nevertheless. "Indeed. She wishes to have the best, and I've agreed to help procure them." He drains his teacup and stands, laying three more sheets of paper out in front of Ianto before turning away. "Send these to the assignment division in the palace no later than noon the day after tomorrow if you want the position."

Halfway to the door, hat in hand, and he pauses without turning around. "Forgive me for speaking plainly, Jones, but at this point in time I truly don't see anything for you to lose. You've nothing as it is now. How could anything in the future be worse?"

He's is all but out the door before Ianto finds his voice to retort, "There's always something worse, Singh."

"And only a coward would let that keep them from walking forwards," Singh answers without missing a beat. "We went to the Academy together, Jones; I never took you for a coward then."

The door closes behind him with a soft thump, and the house suddenly tumbles back into silence. Ianto sits at the kitchen table, hands clenched into fists beside his cup, and slowly breathes out.

Singh is right.

Ianto is many things, but a coward isn't one of them.

* * *

Jack Harkness is brilliant, bold and larger than life, and Ianto falls into his sphere of influence as though drawn by some great magnet. The lieutenant comes every day, wandering around as Ianto and the other mechanists keep up the clockwork and fix the numerous small problems that arise. Once, he even accompanies Adeola and Ianto to the engineering deck and hovers cheerfully on the outskirts of the minor civil war that breaks out over power output and efficiency.

It's a little terrifying how quickly Ianto comes to gravitate towards him, how very like Ianto's sun Jack becomes without even trying.

But then, Ianto's never loved before, and first loves are always at least a little destructive. Of course, Ianto is entirely new to the concept of love for anything but machines and mechanisms and automata, and entirely unaware of just what it is that sends his heart into triple-time when Jack Harkness smiles at him.

He's been working all night—one of the cogs cracked and threw off the entire system it was a part of, which knocked out the starboard rudder system and sent both Navigation and Engineering into fits of mixed indignation and horror—covered in grease and sweat and other sticky, disgusting things when Jack appears around the corner, hands tucked in the pockets of his neat black trousers.

Ianto hates him, just a bit, for looking that clean.

(He doesn't know it yet, but this is a theme with most mechanists, and a sentiment that Ianto himself will repeat many times in the future.)

But Jack takes Ianto's oil-stained hand in his clean one, smiles so brightly, and Ianto loses all coherency of thought. Moreover, he _doesn't care_. All his life, his mind has defined him, but right now, under the force of Jack's bright blue eyes, Ianto cannot physically care any less than he does. Jack is just _everything_, and that is…

Terrifying, true, but also _amazing._

"Come on," Jack says with a bright smile, more lovely than any human being has any right to be, and pulls Ianto off of his back and up to his feet. "We're just about to break upper cloud cover. You have to see it."

"I don't see _why_," Ianto objects, even as he allows Jack to drag him through the doorway. Adeola watches him go with amusement clear on her face, Myfanwy twisting about her ankles as a cat, but she says nothing to stop them.

Ianto isn't entirely certain if he's disappointed or glad.

The deck is blustery, the wind cold and fierce despite their lack of speed. The few passengers who have ventured out are bundled up tightly, looking more like overstuffed dolls than people. Jack shoots Ianto a quick grin, inviting him to share in the amusement of a sailor, already well adapted to the cold. Ianto laughs a bit, because it _is_ funny, seen from that angle.

"Breaking cover!" one of the sailors passing across the deck calls, and as one most of the passengers turn for the doors. For those who have lived their entire lives sandwiched between two layers of clouds, breaking through either stratum is unnerving and a little frightening—especially the lower level, below which lie the scorched and barren Wastes, the remnants of another age.

But Jack never hesitates, pulling him around the forecastle before releasing him in favor of the rungs set into the metal. He climbs like a monkey—_or_, Ianto thinks with amusement, _like a sailor_—straight up, and pauses at the top to look back at Ianto.

"Coming?" he asks cheekily, and then disappears onto the roof of the forecastle.

It's a challenge. Ianto knows it is, knows he's being baited, but he is physically _incapable_ of not accepting.

With an aggravated sigh, he follows Jack, even as the airship begins to rise.

The top of the forecastle is flat, with a low railing running around the edge in a perfunctory safety measure. Jack's on the far side, hanging on to the wrought metal as the ship angles upwards, engines thrumming as it ascends. Ianto picks his way across the tilted expanse, wary of his footing, to join him. In a movement that is as natural as it is unexpected, Jack reaches out a hand as soon as Ianto is close enough, hooks it around his waist, and pulls him against the heat of his side.

"There," he says as the world around them is overwhelmed by deep grey vapor, and Ianto follows his pointing finger to where he can see the faintest hint of brightness. It's growing larger, stronger, and Jack's fingers lace through his clockwork ones just as they break through the clouds and into the open air.

The brilliance of the unfiltered sun is like a slap in the face, and the crisp, nearly tangy clear air all but burns as it fills Ianto's lungs. His gasp is soundless, his voice stolen by the sudden expanse of roiling grey clouds falling away beneath them and the fiery radiance of the setting sun in a vast breadth of azure-blue.

Ianto's never seen the open sky before, and here, now, like this—

Then Jack turns to face him, kisses him sweetly, fiercely, and there's nothing in the whole world that could ever make this better.

* * *

The paperwork goes in on time, well ahead of the deadline, and Singh sends a messenger with the conformation one hour after it lands on the assignment division's desk. Ianto sees the boy off, a coin for his trouble clutched in one sweaty hand, and then seizes his coat off the stand by the door and heads out. He barely takes the time to put on his gloves, settle Myfanwy on his shoulder, or jam his hat onto his head before he's striding into the busy street. It's hardly his usual time to be about, but his mind is buzzing and his blood is humming through his veins with an odd mixture of horror and excitement.

He's done it.

He's _done it._

There is a cold wind rising, a storm brewing around the city, but Ianto makes for the wall regardless. It's dangerous, a risk to be on the wall whenever the weather takes an ill turn, but like this Ianto doesn't want to be anywhere else. He mounts the stairs at a near run, one flight, two, four, six flights, all the way to the top.

One step up onto the wide top of the barrier wall and the wind howls in Ianto's ears, fierce and freezing. He steels himself against it, crossing to stand right before the crenellations, where the wall falls away and all that's left is a breathtaking expanse of clouds gathering below, spread out like a pewter carpet. Far away, so far that it's barely a speck on the horizon, is another mountaintop rising above the clouds, another city bravely pushing up into the aether.

It's brisk and beautiful and a little humbling to stand here, so high above the city, with even the birds below him. Ianto sucks in a long, deep breath that's so cold it burns his lungs and then lets it out with all of the anxiety and fear and consternation he's been hoarding in his heart for the past few days.

With a deep, humming thrum that Ianto can feel all the way to the marrow of his bones, a sleek and silver airship rises from the left and sweeps out into the grey-dark sky, dipping to just barely skim the clouds before rising once more into the atmosphere above the city.

Ianto watches it go with a faint smile, a deep surge of _want_ swelling in his chest. There's a mechanist somewhere on that ship, surrounded by gears and sprockets and springs, immersed in the mechanics that allow such a great beast to fly. And soon, Ianto will be in the same position, will be a mechanist on an airship just as he's always wanted. _Torchwood _will take off from the docks in just that way, soaring out into the blue sky high above the treacherous, deadly Wastes below, and Ianto will be the reason for her flight.

Once again, Ianto acknowledges that Singh is far more correct than Ianto would usually admit to.

He's no coward, and with his dreams—perhaps a little tarnished, a little worn, but all the more beautiful for that—so close to within his reach, he can't even begin to recall what he was afraid of.

The clouds below are seething, deep steel grey edging towards black, and those above are equally dark. Thunder rumbles ominously, and in the distance a flicker of blue-white light illuminates the other mountaintop. If he listens hard, Ianto can just make out the warning bells on the docks as they start to ring, telling ships to either land or retreat above the second layer of clouds.

A moment later, something wet strikes Ianto's cheek. There's a pause, breathless and tense, and then the heavens open up and drench the city in an instant.

Taking a long, slow breath, Ianto raises his head to the rain and closes his eyes. There's something marvelous about the first few drops of rain in a storm, something fresh and inimitable, and even if no amount of water will ever be able to wash the city entirely clean, it certainly helps. And, from this height, standing up above everything else, Ianto can pretend that it's good and perfect and lovely, because it certainly seems that way beneath the breaking storm.

_Torchwood _is set to launch in four days. Ianto can't remember the last time he looked forward to anything quite so much.

* * *

The pirates take them entirely by surprise.

The only warning that Ianto gets is a heavy banging on the door of the Mechanism Room. He turns his head halfway from the system he's working on, trying to divide his attention enough to see who it is while not blowing out this entire arrangement or overbalancing Myfanwy, who's sleeping draped across his shoulders. Perched on the catwalk's railing beside him—as he always seems to be nowadays—Jack frowns a little and rises to his feet, even as Adeola leaves her own work and stalks to the heavy steel door, jerking it open with a snapped, "What?"

The sight of a tall, heavy, filthy man pointing a pistol in her face is entirely unexpected, for all of them.

Jack goes for his gun, but before he can even aim the pirate has an arm locked around Adeola's neck and the muzzle of his pistol pressed tight against her temple. The sound of it cocking is entirely too loud, even over the hum of the surrounding clockwork.

"Try," the pirate invites with a sharp smile that is all teeth. "Let's see who's faster, sailor."

Jack bares his teeth in return, but lets his pistol fall to the decking with a clatter, and then kicks it away. Beside him, Ianto gets up, every muscle tight. This isn't his ship, and this isn't his crew, but they're still his _friends_. They're the first people besides Rupert who have been able to look past the clockwork arm and the mechanist's trappings to see the young man beneath. The thought of losing any of them is more than Ianto can bear.

Other pirates file in behind the first, armed to the teeth and clearly covetous of the perfectly spinning clockwork. Ianto grits his teeth to keep from saying anything, and clutches Myfanwy close as she worriedly slips down from his shoulder to the crook of his elbow. Jack puts a hand on his shoulder, too, and Ianto wryly acknowledges just how well Jack has come to know him in the past three weeks to realize just how stupid Ianto is willing to be when the things he loves are threatened.

Of course, Jack likely isn't aware that he's included in that group. Ianto hasn't been able to tell him, hasn't found a time to say anything when it wouldn't be sappy or soppy or out of place. He doesn't even know if Jack will accept it—and if such a sentiment is entirely unwanted, unwelcome, what will Ianto do then? What—?

A rifle jabs toward his chest, and Ianto has to resist the very strong urge to roll his eyes at the pirate motioning him on. Thankfully, Jack is able to look properly intimidated, and shoves Ianto forward none too gently as the raiders march their prisoners out into the corridor.

They're deposited, along with half of the engineers and most of the other mechanists, in one of the large empty supply rooms. It's completely bare of everything except some dust, with a single vent high up on the wall and a few weak lights clustered around the corners. The first pirate—a leader of some sort, or at least someone fairly high up the food chain, Ianto suspects—grins nastily at them, waves the supply room key beneath their collective nose, and swaggers back out. The door closes behind him with a click and then a thump of the tumblers locking, even as Adeola lunges forward with a growl.

Ianto takes some comfort in the fact that she's not entirely sensible when it comes to her clockwork, either.

Perhaps luckily, Gareth catches her by the shoulders before she can get more than a few feet, holding her back until, still seething but rather more contained, she subsides. Even Ianto is a little awed at her language, though, and he lived on the streets. She's very creative.

But Jack isn't looking at her; he's watching the door with a grim set to his mouth. When Ianto shoots him a questioning glance, he returns the steady gaze and asks flatly, "What are the chances of raiders like that having a qualified mechanist along with them?"

Adeola and Gareth trade glances, and Adeola draws herself up. "Not good," she answers after a moment. "One mechanist, maybe, and if we're lucky. But the _Canary_ is an old bird. It takes more than one mechanist to run her. More than one engineer, too." She nods over at the group of engineers, all of whom have congregated around their chief.

The man nods back, looking equally unhappy with this turn of affairs. "I'd say we've got two hours—three, tops, and then only with a lot of luck—before something blows that can't be fixed."

"How many of them are there? Did anyone see?" Jack asks, and it's easy to see why he's already a lieutenant when he's only a few years older than Ianto. It feels natural that he be the one to take charge—even if, in this case, Ianto doubts having a leader will do much of anything at all.

Then Myfanwy chirrups softly from under his arm, and Ianto stills, even as his mind immediately goes racing ahead.

All right. That could work.

He drops to his knees on the metal floor, setting the automaton down gently before turning to his clothes and beginning to strip off his layers as quickly as possible. It's only when the lack of noise registers that he looks up to find that everyone is watching him—rather incredulously, most of them—and flushes crimson.

Damn his pale complexion, anyway.

"Ianto?" Jack asks mischievously. "If this is the part where you suggest 'we're all about to die, let's get busy' sex, I admire your enthusiasm, but you should really have a bit more faith in—"

"Die," Ianto growls, certain that his ears are blindingly scarlet, even as the others smother chuckles. "I've an idea on how to get us out of here."

Jack has the nerve to bloody _pout_. Ianto does not understand why he loves this man.

Thankfully for Jack's continued existence, Adeola comes to crouch beside Ianto, dark eyes interested. "How? Did you grab any—?"

Ianto shakes his head, cutting her off before she can get her hopes up. "No, nothing except for what comes built in." He tugs his shirt the rest of the way off, dropping it to the ground with the rest of his upper layers, and the room goes very, very quiet.

"A prosthetic," Adeola murmurs, instantly entranced. She reaches out to run her fingers over the bare metal framework, skimming over the delicate clockwork systems beneath. "I thought you were just augmented. This is…"

"By the Doctor," Ianto finishes, already knowing what she's going to say. The Doctor's work is distinctive, after all. "With a few of my own modifications, of course."

The grin Adeola flashes at him is entirely understanding. She's a mechanist too, after all.

"Got something to cut through the door on that thing?" Jack asks mildly, leaning over the pair of them and ignoring the affronted glares he gets for his remark. He's gotten remarkably good at brushing such things off, though, as they tend to land on him whenever he says something unforgivably ignorant on the subject of mechanisms or engines.

At length, Ianto rolls his eyes again and goes back to his arm. "No," he answers, detaching the small, slender key from where it's attached to his wrist bone—for a certain value of "wrist bone," of course.

And "his."

Myfanwy sees the key and immediately sits up with a bright chirp, eyes fixed on it unwaveringly as every other gaze in the place turns to her.

"No," Jack says. "We're not using the _clockwork cat_ to play 'fetch the jailer's keys, there's a good girl.' That's a _terrible_ plan, Ianto."

Ianto's second glare is no less withering than the first. He ignores the lieutenant and instead turns to Myfanwy with a smile. "Come on, my lovely. Are you ready?"

She pounces into his lap, and really, that's answer enough. Ianto strokes her head, then slides the key into the nearly invisible slot in the center of her chest and turns it carefully.

With a grinding and creaking of sprockets and springs, the cat's shape folds in on itself and then expands, the silken-fine fur sliding away to be replaced with silver and gold feathers. Fifty seconds is all it takes before the hissing cogs stop, and a small nightingale sits at Ianto's feet, fluttering her wings.

Ianto lets out a slow breath of relief, as he always does—because there's _so much_ that could go wrong, and if something did, he's not entirely certain he could stand it. Then he smiles at the nightingale now perching on his knee and murmurs, "Myfanwy, be a dear and grab the keys, would you?"

Myfanwy whistles her agreement and launches herself into the air, flutters out through the vent, and is lost to the darkness.

Ianto takes a breath, steels himself for whatever he might see when he looks up—he and Jack have never been intimate, never taken that final step, because Ianto was never entirely certain of just this reaction—and raises his head.

Jack regards him for a long moment, blue eyes unreadable.

And then he grins, wide and full of devilish wickedness, white teeth flashing. "So. Do you think you could make a weapon out of that thing?"

The question takes a second to register. Ianto glances down at his arm, up at Jack, and then back down. He thinks it over, and at long last offers up a grin of his own. It's not a nice expression.

"I'll see what I can do," he promises, and starts tweaking.

* * *

There is a woman made of clockwork in the engine room, thin and tall—much taller than Ianto, who is certainly not short—with long hair that is more salt than pepper. Ianto stands in the doorway for a moment, watching as she leans over a particularly intricate section of clockwork, head tilted slightly to one side as she listens. Her skin is pale, nearly translucent, and Ianto can see the gears and mechanisms beneath it, little smears of gold and bronze and silver that rise to the surface and then subside again.

Perched on his shoulder in nightingale form, Myfanwy gives a quiet chirp and shakes out her wings with a clatter of metal feathers. The sound is soft, but the woman startles regardless, spinning around in surprise. Her eyes widen as they settle on Ianto, and she takes a quick step back, dropping her gaze.

"Hello," Ianto greets her gently. "I'm sorry for startling you. No one informed me that there was already an automaton looking after things here."

Warily, the woman raises her head, the polished blue chalcedony of her eyes narrowing. She looks at Ianto for a moment, shifts her gaze to Myfanwy, and her eyes widen again. "Mechanist," she says in surprise, and dips into a bow. "Forgive me. They did not say they had found _Torchwood _a mechanist. I was not expecting you."

"Miscommunication on several parts, it seems," Ianto says cheerfully enough, dropping his satchel and traveling bag off to the side; he won't be going home again, not with the amount of work remaining before the launch. His nerves are all thrumming with excitement and a little bit of trepidation; the flight is tomorrow, and while he's overseen the placement of nearly every gear and spring on the Mechanism Deck, there has never been an airship like _Torchwood_ before. The design has never been fully tested, and they're about to fly her right across charted space and out into the Unknown beyond the farthest mountaintop-city.

At her slightly raised eyebrow, which clearly communicates her expectation, Ianto realizes he's forgotten the important bit of his introduction entirely, and quickly adds, "I'm Ianto Jones, Chief Mechanist."

(And isn't that title still a thrill to rival the launch? Ianto has to wonder if the awe will ever entirely fade. Somehow, he rather doubts it.)

"I am called Mainframe," the automaton woman responds, folding her hands before her. "And I am the control unit for _Torchwood_. Let us work well together."

"Control unit?" Ianto stills at the foot of the ladder leading up to the catwalk and looks back at Mainframe. "I know proposed hiring or building one in the original plans, but I never thought it would be approved. You're—"

"An older model unit from a United Intelligence Taskforce ship, updated by Rupert Howarth," Mainframe finishes. "He completed his work on me two months ago, and I was sent here to accustom myself to _Torchwood_ before the launch."

Ianto rolls his eyes. Of _course_ Rupert has had a hand in this. Content with viewing Ianto's success from the docks, indeed.

"Well met then, Mainframe," he says after a moment. "It will be an honor to fly with you." He offers a hand, smiling, and Myfanwy flutters excitedly on his shoulder.

Mainframe blinks at Ianto for a long moment before dropping her gaze to his hand. Tentatively, she reaches out to grasp it, but the motion is unfamiliar, as though she's only seen it done before, and never participated herself. Still, her grip is strong, and Ianto returns it equally.

"Mechanist," she says simply as they separate, and there's wry humor and acknowledgement and appreciation all mixed up in her pale blue eyes. "I had forgotten."

Ianto offers her a slightly weary smile, because he knows very well what she means. Mechanists and automata are both regarded warily, held at a distance even in a world that has been built up upon their shoulders. Automata are feared because they are machines that have the appearance of souls, at the very least, and mechanists because they are the ones who can give the automata the appearance of souls in the first place. It is an uncomfortable thing, especially when mechanists are rarely seen, and so often elevated to gods or monsters, or a strange mix of the two, in the people's eyes.

With a sharp thump that makes them both turn, the message tube in the wall drops down, revealing a red canister bearing an alert from the Bridge. After a heartbeat, Mainframe scoops it up and opens it.

"They want a test run, to see if all systems are working properly," she says, scanning Hartman's sharp, imperious script. "No flight, just a start-up. Fifteen minutes to prepare."

Myfanwy launches herself into the air as Ianto leaps up onto the ladder and starts to climb quickly. "Send back our acknowledgement," he calls. "Then let's get this beast in the air, what do you say?"

Even as he sets foot on the catwalk, three more messages drop down—a green canister from Engineering, blue from Navigation, and another red. Mainframe laughs, bright as bells and sweet as smoothly spinning clockwork. Somewhere high above their heads, gongs are ringing to signal a launch preparation, and Ianto strides down the length of the walkway, pulling levers and turning wheels, inputting the specifics that Mainframe calls up from below. _Torchwood_ hums beneath his tall black boots, bright and eager, and Ianto breathes with the buzz of the churning gears as they start up, filling the deck with noise.

_Perfect_, he thinks, and it _is_.

* * *

Despite all misgivings—none of them Ianto's, of course; he knows very well what she's capable of—Myfanwy crawls back through the vent in short order, this time as a cat, with Ianto's tool bag in her teeth.

Ianto has never been so glad that she can make the bird-to-cat transition by herself—a safety feature he included to keep any other cats from eating her, which apparently has other uses besides the immediately obvious.

It feels natural to turn to Jack, arching a brow in wordless demand. Jack's return stare is equally mulish, but he looks away after a few moments with a mutter of, "Well, it's not the _key_."

Ianto rolls his eyes, but steps under the vent and holds out his hands. "Let it go, Myfanwy, there's a girl. I'll take care of it."

Myfanwy meows, muffled through her grip on the leather, but doesn't release the bag. Instead, she clumsily launches herself out of the vent, and Ianto's heart entirely stops for the second and half it takes for her to collide with his chest.

"Oomph," he grunts, staggering back, because Myfanwy is steel and silver and copper rather than flesh and bone, with all the weight difference that implies. He lands on his arse on the floor, dignity bruised more than any other attribute, and has to clamp down on the urge to roll his eyes yet again.

_Why_ is it that he wants to be a mechanist again?

Adeola appropriates his tools before he can offer to take care of the lock himself, and her fingers are nearly as quick as Ianto's street-trained ones. She's quiet, too, so whoever's outside has no warning at all when Jack gives the nod, and she throws the door open with all her strength.

Five pirates left on guard, and Jack takes one of them immediately. Gareth, surprisingly scrappy for an Academy-trained, Society-born mechanist, takes another, and the Chief Engineer goes after a third as Jack moves on to his next opponent. But the fifth pirate is apparently smarter, or luckier. He goes after Jack's unprotected back, long knife flashing dully in the corridor's dimness.

Ianto hits him with a burst of incredibly concentrated light from his mechanical arm, powerful enough to cut through steel, and the pirate tumbles down with a thud, never to move again.

Jack half-turns, casting Ianto a brilliant smile that Ianto returns, heady with victory, and then waves them on down the hall and towards victory.

The pirates on the bridge never know what hits them.

And when they win, when the raiders are all rounded up by a gaggle of very unhappy and rather harried mechanists and engineers, desperate to return to their deck, when the captain shakes Jack's hand and promises him a recommendation to whichever ship he wants, when Jack turns to Ianto and smiles so widely, so brilliantly—

Well.

Ianto smiles in return, and when Jack invites him into his cabin with a winsome smile and warm hands and careful, calculated kisses, he doesn't resist at all.

When he wakes up in the morning to an empty bed, to a docked ship and no Jack Harkness anywhere to be found, he thinks that maybe his heart wouldn't be quite so shattered if he'd resisted just a little bit, regardless of the outcome.

* * *

Of course, it doesn't go smoothly. Ianto's been around airships long enough not to expect it to, however, and just sighs and rolls his eyes at the dozens of new problems that crop up one after another. They're nothing serious, nothing that will halt the launch tomorrow afternoon, but they're inconvenient and take time to fix, and it's time that could be better spent on other things. Like sleeping.

Several hours after midnight, he and Mainframe surface from the latest round of tweaks and touch-ups to feed themselves and scrub off the top layer of oil and grime. Ianto takes his damp towel and settles himself on the lowest stair, trying not to let his weariness get to him. _Torchwood_ is a marvelous beast, an airship grander than any other, but she's _enormous_, and while she's been touted as so advanced she can all but fly herself without the aid of a crew, a mechanist and a control unit are still as necessary to her as air.

With a soft exhale and a hiss of tired gears, Mainframe sinks down to the floor in front of him, tall brown boots scraping over the grating as she stretches out her long legs. Her dark grey corset's come loose over the course of their work, and Ianto absently reaches out to tighten it for her. She tosses him a quick smile over one shoulder, and murmurs, "If you would be willing to re-braid my hair as well, I would not complain."

Ianto smiles back, tying off the laces and touching one shoulder where it's left bare by her sleeveless red vest. Her skin is smooth, but he can feel the gears beneath it humming away. "It would be my honor, Madame Mainframe."

He'd rather forgotten what it was like, working with a human-form automaton. _Easy_ is the first word that comes to mind. Or perhaps _comfortable _is closer to the truth. Unlike working with a human engineer, he doesn't have to try to be anything but what he is, and that's truly a lovely feeling. It's all right that she sees him speaking to the vast, intricate arrays of clockwork that power _Torchwood_. It's fine if she sees the way he touches the metal and wood and stone of the great gear-driven motors—reverently, carefully, more tender than a lover and more awed than a worshiper in some hallowed temple. Mainframe understands, because she is a mechanist's creation, a being shaped by the force of that awe and reverence into what she is now.

"The mainspring will hold, no matter what Hartman puts it through," she says after a moment, as Ianto's fingers card through her graying hair, separating it into three sections. "Though I am worried about—"

"The torque on Gear IV? Yes, I'd say it could be putting out more. Maybe an alignment problem—I tried to oversee all the placements myself, but Martha sent me home whenever I'd been here over twenty-four hours." Ianto frowns, fingers weaving the strands together absently. "We'll have to take a look at that. If the setting's off, it could be a disaster later."

Mainframe turns her head slightly to study Gear IV, a mid-sized cog that stands as tall as Ianto. "We should be able to reset it ourselves, without calling in an engineer," she agrees after a moment. "Should I check it first?"

"That would likely be best." Ianto nods, tying off the braid with a strip of leather. "No sense in doing all the work unnecessarily, if alignment's not the problem." He hesitates, judging for a moment, and murmurs, "But…let's give it a minute."

He's _tired_, still running low on sleep from the past few days and a long visit with Rupert yesterday morning, settling affairs. Rupert is an oddball of an earl, and at this point he's so far out of touch with Society that his heir can escape being taken on the social rounds and presented before the lords like some particularly clever performing monkey—one of the reasons Ianto agreed in the first place. However, the Academy needed to be notified, and the solicitors had descended like a plague to change Rupert's last will and testament.

Ianto doesn't want to think of a time when he'll be the Earl of Castlehaven, and Rupert will be dead. He agreed to be named heir for all of the wrong reasons, and can't help the slivers of guilt worming their way into his heart because of it.

But it's done, and Ianto isn't going to change his decision—likely couldn't even if he tried, at this point, knowing Rupert and how well he knows Ianto.

"Very well," Mainframe agrees, and there's amused sympathy on her face as she looks up at him. As an automaton, she doesn't know weariness the same way Ianto does, though it's a gross exaggeration to say she doesn't know it at all. As Ianto settles back against the metal stairs, she stands, stretching out limbs and joints. "Take a moment, Jones. I will check the gears again."

There is a pod off to one side of the deck, with a hatch made of the finest, clearest glass. Mainframe steps into it, synthetic skin already retracting like a tightly fitting suit finally peeled back. She turns, settling against the padded back of the pod, and the glass slides down over her with a soft hiss. The automaton woman closes her eyes, and Ianto finds himself holding his breath regardless of how he trusts Rupert's mechanical skills. Control units are always vulnerable to the slightest flaws in their pods.

But nothing awful happens. Mainframe simply takes a deep breath and lets it out, and _Torchwood_ breathes with her. The engines thrum, the gears tremble, and the ship _awakens _around themwith a hum that Ianto can feel all the way to his bones.

Control units are incredible, even among the human-form automata, Ianto allows with a shaky sigh as Myfanwy swoops out of the darkness to alight on his shoulder. They are able to use the pods to expand their awareness to every single inch of their ship, from the smallest spring to the greatest steam engine, and then _control_ it. Such automata are the reason the airships in the Fleet can be so complex, so intricately wrought. And _mechanists_ are the ones responsible for these incredible creatures, for building and maintaining them.

The only thing Ianto has ever wanted to be as much as a mechanist is a control unit.

Ianto counts six minutes of silence, and then a drum of paper set into the wall beside the control pod begins to unscroll to the thudding of type keys. He pushes himself to his feet and takes it as it unrolls, studying the shorthand code that is Mainframe's diagnostic. Gear IV is fine, it seems—all it needs is a bit more oil to turn smoothly. There is, however, a problem on the Engineering Deck, which is lessening the amount of power their engines generate and forcing the clockwork up here to turn more slowly than is ideal.

Feeling vindictively satisfied, Ianto waves his thanks to Mainframe and stalks over to the message tube, plucking a white canister from the rack to compose a politely scathing message to Rajesh's engineers. Perhaps even Rajesh himself, if he's still there—Ianto doesn't tolerate sloppiness from anyone, especially in regards to his mechanisms.

* * *

There's no more risk of Ianto not surviving. He's settled in this life now, mechanical arm and all, and regardless of disappearing lieutenant-lovers and broken hearts, he's a mechanist. He knows better than anyone that life will go on, differences or no.

Perhaps that's why he falls into everything with Lisa so very quickly. She's bright and beautiful and quick-witted, and there's a certain turn to her smile that reminds Ianto inexorably of Jack. She's lovely of her own accord, but that similarity is enough to break Ianto's heart all over again, in the same moment that it eases the ache.

Perhaps that's why, when she falls ill, Ianto turns to that final, forbidden practice forbidden to all mechanists and engineers who might be mad enough to consider it and skilled enough to attempt it.

He builds a mechanical body, gives it a human heart, and tries to think of it as Lisa.

Maybe it is and maybe it isn't, but the similarities, as ever, are enough to shatter Ianto one more time when she's taken and destroyed for the grave crime of existing, of being created by Ianto's hand.

There might not be any recovery from this breaking, though, if Yvonne Hartman and the Council have anything to say on the subject of human experimentation and rogue mechanists.

Ianto is simply unable to find it within himself to care.

He keeps on not caring until Rajesh Singh approaches him with a rough outline of plans for the greatest airship to ever take to the skies, and then _Torchwood_ takes over his mind and, just perhaps, clockwork ends up saving his life once more.


End file.
